Tommy reached the end of the file and sighed. "I don't understand," he said, frustrated. "It should be in there."
"Maybe she took it with her," Reece offered.
Tommy considered the idea for a brief second and then shook it off. "No. According to what we know about Annie, she wouldn't dare take something out of the building, no matter how interesting or tempting it might have been. If she found the paper here, then it must still be here."
"Maybe there is another room," Adriana suggested as she approached.
"That's possible," Tommy said.
"Then perhaps I should ask your friend there if there is anywhere else we should check."
Sean gave up on his file and moved back over to Tommy's. "Mind if I go through this one, you know, just in case?"
"Be my guest," Tommy said. "Maybe you'll have better luck."
Sean didn't respond. He stepped between Tommy and the row of papers and folders. Then he wedged his hands between two random sections and pulled the two ends apart. There were good amount of files on either side, but Sean was able to get enough space between the two to see down to the bottom of the drawer.
Lying there—inconspicuous beneath the other folders and files—was a single sheet of drab paper encased in protective plastic. Sean's lips creased on the right side of his face. He turned his head to the museum director, who was busy pecking away at the keyboard. "Mr. Kurt?"
The man looked up from his computer.
"Do you happen to have a pair of handling gloves?" Sean asked. "It's wrapped in plastic, but better safe than sorry."
Tommy moved close and stood on his tiptoes to see over Sean's shoulder. He sighed. "Always gotta show me up, huh?"
9
Sydney
"Mr. Wyatt, I really must insist..." Wilbur was beyond irritated at this point.
After the museum director brought Tommy a pair of white gloves, he stepped back and watched as his American hero pulled the plastic-covered paper out of the drawer and placed it on the work desk.
If that had been where the saga ended, he would have been okay. It was what happened next that drove him up a wall.
He stood by and watched as Sean and Tommy stretched out the paper and pressed it hard against the surface of the work table.
"Wilbur," Sean said, "I appreciate the concern...and the lack of trust, but I'd appreciate it if you'd not bother me while I'm working with a potentially priceless and most certainly delicate document."
The two friends finished pressing the paper out flat and then covered it with a thin plastic film Wilbur had provided.
"I just think perhaps maybe you should let Mr. Schultz...I mean, Tommy...handle this sort of thing. It isn't the kind of work..." He stopped himself.
Sean finished the thought for him. "The kind of work grunts like me should be doing?"
Wilbur twisted his head to the side and backed down. Before he could say he didn't mean to offend, Sean cut him off.
"None taken, Wilbur. You're right. This sort of thing isn't usually my bag, but I'm better than nothing."
"Plus he's done this with me dozens of times," Tommy added amid an extremely concentrated stare. He'd not taken his eyes off the document during the entire process of the transfer.
Tommy's comment eased Wilbur's mind somewhat. "Just be careful. I can't believe Annie didn't tell me about this."
Sean leaned over the table. "Well, I'm sure she had a good reason for what she did."
Before Wilbur could rebut, Tommy stood up straight. "All done. Now it's protected from the air. Hopefully it hasn't sustained much damage."
Wilbur couldn't remove his gaze from the old paper. "I apologize, gentlemen, but what exactly were you trying to understand about this document?"
Tommy kept up the charade to keep Annie out of any sort of implication. "You see here," he pointed at the paper. "It's talking about some Aborigine treasure. Apparently this treasure is not insignificant."
Wilbur's reaction was dubious. "I've never heard of any Aboriginal treasure. They typically aren't a people who care for such things."
"Right," Tommy said. "That's what we figured too. That's why it must not be just a financial sort of treasure. Whatever this is, it must have some kind of spiritual meaning to them."
"Of course, something like that would be worth a lot of money," Reece added. "It'd be like the King Tut's tomb of Australia."
Reece's comment lit up Wilbur's eyes again. The visitors could see his mind racing with the possibilities. They knew what he was thinking as soon as the words dripped out of Reece's mouth.
"Incredible," Wilbur whispered. "And...and you think if I help you with this...I mean if you find this thing...would you be willing to let me display it here for a short time?"
Tommy's eyes narrowed like he was about to share a personal secret. "Let me put it this way, Wilbur. I won't forget your help, and I'll make sure the guys at the national place get in line behind you."
Wilbur could barely contain his excitement. The visitors half expected him to squeal. "So what do you think it all means?" He looked back down at the Mathews paper.
The visitors huddled around and read through it again. None of them needed to. They'd pored over it a dozen times already before arriving. Their show was for Wilbur's benefit, and Annie's.
The Americans had another reason for wanting to see the original copy. They hoped there was something else the digital version wouldn't show. As they stood around—gazing at the document—they realized it had nothing left to offer.
"Well," Tommy finally answered, "we're not entirely sure. These directions are fairly vague. It sounds like we should visit this Baiame place."
"Baiame? Like the ancient Aboriginal god?" Wilbur asked. "There's a cave to the north of the city where some cave drawings feature that deity. Do you think maybe that's what the document is talking about?"
The visitors had already surmised that was the next place they needed to visit. No need to cut the act now.
"How far away is this place?" Sean asked.
Wilbur shrugged. "Depends on how fast you drive, traffic, that sort of thing. But not too far."
They'd seen and heard enough. Sean, Tommy, and Adriana badly needed some rest. Reece's eyes were starting to get droopy as well. Time to wind it up and head to the hotel.
"What about this mention of forty-five suns?" Wilbur said.
"It's the way they tracked time in the ancient world," Tommy answered. "Remember, everything was based on the movement of the sun, moon, and stars back then. These circles are suns, as best we can figure. And they stacked them this way to demonstrate multiple days."
"Of course." The museum director almost smacked his forehead with his hand for not thinking of it.
Tommy still wanted to know about one other possibility. They needed to search the desk where Annie found the document. It might still contain something useful. "Wilbur, you don't know where Annie found this thing?"
"No," Wilbur answered. "I haven't the foggiest." Then it hit him. "Wait, you said you'd obtained something about that information prior to coming here."
Tommy beamed as if he was about to reveal a big secret—a continuation of the act. "That's right, Wilbur. You want to know what's been right under your nose this whole time without you knowing?"
The museum director nodded eagerly.
"Perhaps you could save us some time. Do you happen to have any antique desks sitting around in here?"
"As a matter of fact, we do have one. It's on the other side of the room. Follow me."
Wilbur led the way by the row of boxes and the other six rows filled with all sorts of trinkets and precious items from yesteryear. He turned the corner and pointed at a large wooden desk down toward the other end of the row.
Tommy beamed. "Outstanding, Wilbur." He picked up his pace and strode rapidly over to the desk. He turned back as the others joined him. "Okay for me to open these drawers?"
Wilbur nodded. There was no chance he was going to say no at this point. The
hook tugged on his adrenal gland.
Tommy carefully pulled out the first. Seeing it was empty, he moved to the second. It, too, proved vacant. The last drawer on the right stuck stubbornly on its rails but after a hard pull came loose. Still empty.
Tommy moved to the other side and investigated the final two drawers as he'd done on the right-hand side, but the desk contained nothing of interest. "I guess if there was anything else in here it's long gone by now," he said.
Sean looked underneath the desk's seating position and noticed the little flap dangling from the main panel. "And now it appears we know where the document was found."
He stepped back and let the others crowd around—each peering under the desk to see the hidden storage place.
"Classic," Adriana said.
"You've seen this sort of thing before?" Wilbur asked.
She shrugged. "You break into enough places, you'll see lots of things."
Her comment unsettled the museum director, but Tommy quickly intervened. "What she means is, it's not that uncommon. There must be a mechanism of some sort that got knocked loose to open the hidden door." He flipped over on his back and squirmed under the desk to get a closer look.
He turned on his phone's LED light and held it up to the rectangular hole in the wood. "It's pretty amazing craftsmanship," he said. "The hinges are invisible from the outside. And the seam is cut along the grain in the wood so it appears natural." He flipped the door up until it was almost flush. Tommy didn't close it all the way because he wasn't sure how to get it open again. From what he could tell, that could prove to be a tricky proposition.
"Whoever designed this definitely wanted to keep something hidden."
"Do you see anything else in there?" Reece asked, hunching over to catch a glimpse.
"No. Just the shelf where the document was probably stored. Nothing helpful... Wait a second." He leaned closer to the desk bottom and peered into the hole.
"What is it?" Wilbur asked. His impatient excitement had reached full climax.
"Not sure," Tommy said. "It's small. I mean tiny. I can barely see it. Looks like it was burned into the top of the wood." He craned his neck to the side. "It's a sequence of symbols."
"Symbols?"
"Yeah." Tommy's voice strained slightly. "They're not letters. Just a bunch of random signs."
"Take a picture with your phone," Sean said.
"Really? Thanks, Captain Obvious. I was just about to do that."
Sean chuckled at his friend's comeback. "Just saying; you're taking your sweet time."
"Is he always this impatient?" Tommy asked Adriana.
"I wouldn't know," she answered. "He spends more time with you than he does with me."
Tommy pointed his phone's camera into the recession. "Fair enough." He snapped a few images with the flash and then two more without. A second later he pulled himself out from under the desk and set the device on the desk surface.
A quick tap of the first image brought it to full size on the screen. He pinched his fingers together and then spread them apart to zoom in on the blackened symbols.
"See?" he said.
"Looks like a cipher," Sean said.
"Half of a cipher," Adriana corrected.
"Right."
"Where's the other half?" Reece asked.
"That's the thing about a cipher. The key is always kept somewhere else."
Tommy listened as he continued inspecting the symbols. "He's right. It's the best way to keep a code like this safe. People would give the key to someone they trusted or hide it in a place no one else could find it. Well, other than a person they intended to receive the message."
Wilbur hovered over the group. His fascination reached a fever pitch. "How do you find the key?" His eager voice nearly trembled in the excitement.
"Well, that's the hard part. You never really know. It could be anywhere. Chances are the key is somewhere far from here. Might be in some of his personal property or something like that. Difficult to tell."
"Sometimes," Adriana said, "the things that seem hardest to find are right under your nose." She turned her head back toward the work table where the Mathews document was encased in protective plastic.
The others followed her gaze and realized exactly what she was saying. Well, everyone but Wilbur.
"What?" he asked. "The paper?"
"Sometimes there are codes put into things like that," Sean answered.
"I didn't see anything unusual."
"You're not supposed to. It could be a sequence of words in a certain order that gives it away. Or maybe it isn't meant to be seen."
"What do you mean, isn't meant to be seen?"
"What he means is maybe it was written in invisible ink," Tommy answered.
Wilbur's eyes were already at the point of bursting from their sockets. Somehow they widened just a bit more. "Invisible ink?"
"Yeah. You've heard of it before, right?"
Wilbur nodded. "Yes, but I've never actually seen it. You think there might be a hidden message on the document?"
"It's worth a look. Tell me, for preserving larger items, you probably do some shrink wrapping, right?"
"From time to time."
"That means you probably have a heat gun lying around."
"Sure, but..." Wilbur saw where Tommy was going with the conversation. "That's pretty hot. Won't it damage the paper?"
"Not if we're careful," Sean reassured him. "It's protected by that plastic now. If we keep the tip of the gun far enough away, it should distribute the heat evenly."
Wilbur slowly nodded. "Ah yes. Of course. I'll be right back."
The visitors watched as the man scurried away like a chubby rat in a maze. When he disappeared through the door, they made their way over to the table and inspected the document again.
"You think something might be on this?" Reece asked.
"Only one way to find out," Tommy said.
To the naked eye, nothing stood out right away. While they waited, they pored over the document to see if there was anything out of the ordinary in the way it was worded. After a few minutes of reading and rereading, though, they didn't find anything that remotely looked like a cipher key.
Wilbur nearly burst through the door, proudly clutching a red-and-black heat gun. "Here it is," he announced. A minute later, he'd plugged it into a short extension cord close to the table and held it up for one of the Americans to take.
Tommy and Sean gave a questioning look at each other as if to ask who wanted to do it.
"It's your show," Sean said. "I'm just the co-star."
Tommy sighed and grabbed the gun. He flipped the button, and warm air began flowing through the nozzle. He kept the device several inches above the plastic so as not to overheat the protective layer and accidentally melt it. His hand passed the heat gun back and forth, spreading the warmth evenly across the surface.
"How long does it usually take for the ink to appear?" Wilbur asked in a hushed tone, as if speaking too loudly might mess up the process.
"Not long," Sean answered. "In fact, it should show up right about now."
Everyone leaned in closer, anticipating the moment of truth. The hidden message, however, never appeared.
Tommy gave it a few more passes with the gun and then switched it off. "I was afraid of that."
"What are you doing?" Wilbur asked with desperation in his voice.
"If there was anything written on this document in invisible ink, we would have seen it by now."
"Maybe you need to give it a little more time. Do you think the plastic is keeping the warm air from activating it?"
"Sorry, Wilbur. If there was something to see, we would have seen it. I don't think there's anything here."
"He's right," Sean said. "The key must be somewhere else."
"What if we took the plastic away, you know, just for a minute? Maybe you could get some hot air directly onto the paper."
Adriana put her hand on the man's shoulder. "It's not worth riskin
g the document," she said. "Trust us. There's nothing here."
Wilbur's shoulders slumped. A crestfallen look washed over his face.
"I wish there was something here," Tommy said. "Would make things a lot easier."
Reece had been quiet for several minutes. "Do you suppose this Mathews bloke might have referenced the key in the journal entry itself? Seems pretty clear to me that we have to go to the Baiame Cave. Says that's where the journey began for him. Maybe we're supposed to walk in his footsteps, so to speak."
"Good point," Sean said. "Notice that last part about the foreign stone?"
The group reexamined the paper again.
"Yeah," Tommy said. "That has to be it. Good thinking, Reece. Let's get some sleep and head up there tomorrow."
"Are you sure there's nothing else on this document?" Wilbur asked. A twinge of tension trickled through the words.
"Let it go," Reece said.
"Don't worry, Wilbur," Tommy said. "If we find anything out there, you'll be one of the first to know."
10
Sydney
Wilbur heard something click several feet behind him.
He'd just closed the back entrance to the museum and was about to head to his car. The visitors had only left ten minutes ago. For a second, he thought one of them might have come back.
"Going somewhere?" a familiar voice said from the shadows on the other side of the alley.
Wilbur spun around, startled and terrified. "I...I was just locking up."
"Looks like you're about to go home for the night."
"Yes...yes, I was."
"Seems like you're leaving something out, Wilbur. Like you did in our previous conversations."
"Leave something out?" Wilbur shook his head in little bursts. "No, I wouldn't do that. I'm helping you guys, remember?"
"You don't seem like you're being very helpful."
"What did you tell them?" Jack stood over Wilbur with a gun pointed at the man's forehead.
Wilbur's hands shook violently. His legs weakened, and he almost dropped to his knees. "Nothing. I swear. I didn't tell them anything."
The Sean Wyatt Series Box Set 4 Page 7